This invention relates to the construction, especially the lining, of furnace walls and is particularly concerned with installations utilizing blankets, bats, or blocks of relatively lightweight refractory or heat insulating materials usable at relatively high temperatures.
Many methods and devices have been previously suggested for securing refractory and/or insulating materials as linings to the interior walls of a furnace. In many of such methods or devices the lining is required to have a specific shape, or elaborate hardware on the furnace walls is required. In many instances an exorbitant amount of labor is required. Consequently, there has been a demand for a construction which permits the convenient attachment of refractory and/or insulating material in the form of blankets, sheets, bats, or blocks to furnace walls with a minimum of hardware and accessories and without exposing mounting hardware to furnace atmosphere and temperature.
It has been previously proposed to provide simple and convenient means for lining the walls by securing blankets, sheets, blocks, or bats of ceramic refractory and/or heat-insulating material on furnace walls either in a single layer or in a plurality of layers. In constructing or installing the lining the securing or mounting means may be easily applied wherever necessary or desired, thus giving a flexibility to furnace wall construction which is absent in many prior systems.
Essentially the mounting or securing devices utilized in said previous proposal consist of cup-like or truncated conical ceramic retaining members or anchors, and elongated metal studs by which the anchors are located. Each metal stud is adapted to be secured to a metal wall surface and to so engage an associated ceramic retainer as to hold it in position. More specifically, the metal studs are attached, such as by welding, to the surface of a wall to be insulated, extending essentially perpendicularly from said wall, and having such external configuration as to engage the body of refractory and/or insulating material. The truncated conical ceramic retaining members (hereinafter for convenience referred to as "anchors") may be installed with the desired spacing between them by locating the associated metal stud, forming a hole in the refractory or insulating material around the stud, inserting the anchor therein so as to engage the stud, and locking the anchor to the stud by rotating 90 degrees. The interior portion of the anchor may then be filled with a suitable refractory material so as to protect that portion of the stud projecting therein.
It is often necessary to support electrical heating elements in a furnace lined in the aforesaid manner and this has hitherto been achieved by mounting ceramic bobbins on separate, elongated metal studs secured to a metal wall surface of the furnace. This has the disadvantage that a number of extra components need to be held in stock.
It is an object of the present invention to obviate this disadvantage.